Merrywick had been expecting visitors, but certainly not so soon.

Alfie Declan's puffy eyes radiated a sense of panic that only got stronger upon catching sight of Merrywick. Having hung the plaque on the balcony of the second floor, visible to everyone within a hundred meters of the building, he had scraped together a meal with the leftovers of the previous occupants. He had to put a temporary stop to the emergency meal and wash up to greet the young man.

"Lord Declan, you've arrived earlier than I expected! And..." He took a long look at the entrance of the building before adding, "I don't see Lady Eyreen accompanying you. You came to sector-4 all by yourself? The Earl would not be pleased. Your safety-"

"Cut the crap!" Alfie Declan fired up immediately. "How did you do it? How did you blackmail my father into destroying his business reputation? Do you know how much you've cost him?! Millions! Maybe tens of millions even!"

"Sable or Kora? Which currency are we talking about here?" Merrywick said, eyebrows raised. He had no idea what had happened behind the scenes. The Earl had panicked, for certain. But what had he really done to express his staunch support for Merrywick?

"What kind of bodyguard agency deals in Kora?! Sables, you plebe!" Alfie roared indignantly. 

"Ah, so the Earl runs private protection agencies here! I didn't know that. The business must have been pretty huge if the loss falls on a million scale." Merrywick guided young Declan to the only uncluttered part of the storehouse, pointing out a chair for him to sit in. He himself took a seat behind a desk, getting comfortable for an uncomfortable discussion.

Alfie Declan was, of course, not pleased with the evasive attitude. Kicking the chair out of his way, he leaned over the desk and hissed, "Answer the question. Why did he do that? How are you involved in it?"

The unimpressed expression on Merrywick's face could not be any clearer as he replied, "You don't have the exact... 'station' to know, or demand an answer from me. I'm sure your father advised you for a bit before letting you head out. Did his advice include an encouragement for such aggressive interrogation? Don't think so."

Perhaps the young man hadn't expected to face a reply so arrogant from the servile Merrywick he had met just yesterday, because he didn't reply for quite some time. 

"I'm not leaving without an answer," he said in a determined tone in the end. It made Merrywick laugh. 

"Fine, why don't we make a bet? If you win, I'll answer...one question."

"A bet on what?" Alfie Declan's tone grew cautious.

"A bet on duel performance. Let's have a duel, you and I, mage to mage."

"What type of duel? We've been mages for less than 4 days. Even your silver grade progression system couldn't have assisted you in mastering a spell so quickly, let alone mine."

"I know. But we can still cast spells with limited effects, right? The duel won't be dangerous. Both of us have learned the incantations for some harmless tricks. Let's use those spells to compete. Whoever can produce the greater effect will be the winner."

A pause followed the proposal, and then a nod came from Alfie.

"Fine, but the duel has to be turn-based, not on casting speed."

"Sure, sure." Merrywick's agreement was quick, so quick, in fact, that it made Alfie Declan push for a little more leverage.

"I get to open," he said without a trace of embarrassment.

"...Look at yourself, man. Four days into your life as a mage with a bronze-grade progression system, and you've already made your inferiority a weapon."

Merrywick's barbed insult elicited little response aside from a fiery, hateful glare. Seeing him clinging to the condition, Merrywick could only give up.

"Fine. You get the first turn. Tell me when you're read-"

"Tui!"

A dim red glow burst out around Alfie Declan, heading toward Merrywick, only to disappear half a second later. 

A silence fell between them. Merrywick's unimpressed stare grew more pronounced. And a redness that had little to do with anger spread across Alfie's neck and face.

"I could tell you that I wasn't ready when you cast your spell. Then I could ask you to take the turn again and try for a better effect. But do you want me to?"  

The mocking tone did its job well. Alfie Declan plopped down on his seat, finally, and pointed a finger at him. 

"If I couldn't make that telekinesis spell work, I don't believe you will be able to either. You were discharged from the hospital this morning. Don't you dare take that superior tone with me, Merrywick."

"Only one way to find out if I can do it," Merrywick replied as he turned off the power button of the Voidcoil beneath his desk. 

"Tui!"

Alfie had been expecting the spell, but not the effect that followed the incantation. This Rank-1 spell in particular was a little more than a party trick, meant to conjure a strong telekinetic force around the caster. Of course, in the hands of an expert, it could generate enough force to break down a steel-clad wall. Merrywick had once seen a video of a rank-3 mage using the spell to crush a hijacked truck. 

In comparison, the effect he produced was akin to an ant's ability. Alfie Declan was thrown off his chair, his head barely avoiding a concussion as he crashed to the floor. His back scrubbed the dust off the floor, for which Merrywick was doubly grateful.

"....Agh!" 

Alfie's reaction took its sweet time to come out. Part of his slowness was due to the shock from receiving the powerful push, and the rest was because he couldn't immediately accept that Merrywick could make the spell work when he hadn't been able to.

Quietly, Merrywick reactivated the Voidcoil. Alfie Declan jumped to his feet and dusted himself off, the redness in his fair face now turning faint purple. 

"That makes no sense. I practiced it so many times..." he muttered to himself in a daze, not even looking at Merrywick. "Why couldn't I make it work? I want to try again! Tui!"

Once again, his spell elicited the primary response. A red glow flashed around him just like the previous two times. But it never reached Merrywick. 

"Watch me do it. Tui!" Merrywick shouted back at him. Red light flared, Alfie Declan was shoved back a couple of meters once more, but this time he was ready. He didn't fall. 

"Again! Tui!...Damn it!"

"Tui." Merrywick didn't move an inch from his seat, not even appearing excited about the competition. His nonchalance only served to fire Alfie up. This time, he kept the Voidcoil on for himself, and off the young aristocrat, just to encourage him and not suspect the reality of his helplessness.

"Yes!" Alfie roared in excitement upon seeing Merrywick being shoved back to the large crate behind the desk. "I won!"

"Once out of four turns. You have to defeat me there more times to make the score even. Then you can ask me questions for each new win."

That didn't deter the passionate young man. "No problem! I needed to fulfill my daily missions quota anyway. I'll get something out of this anyway! I know you will too! Dueling other mages is the most common daily mission in all grades of progression systems."

"Oh, how perceptive! I underestimated you, that's for certain." Merrywick cracked a smile. The trick he was using to fool Alfie would have never actually worked, not even yesterday. The incident today was the culprit behind Alfie's oversight. Merrywick couldn't be sure what the Earl had told his son before sending him off to sector-4, all alone. But he could easily guess that the Earl had at least warned Alfie Declan to be careful around him, to treat him as a superior, directly or indirectly. Not even a Duke had the gall to challenge a mage directly placed under a deity's care. 

This warning had caused Alfie Declan to feel angry, rebellious even, but only because he trusted his father's words. Inwardly he believed that Merrywick, as a mage, was special in some way, be it by the grade of his progression system, or because of the secret his father was hiding, the secret which had forced his father to sacrifice tens of millions for seemingly nothing. 

This was why he had never doubted for a second that he was losing against Merrywick because of the simplest trick in the book. He had never suspected that an opponent of this caliber would play dirty from the get-go.